


essential truths

by rangerhitomi



Series: gods and dragons [1]
Category: Cardfight!! Vanguard
Genre: Almost Kiss, CFVG, Canon Compliant, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Existential Crisis, GIRS Crisis, Ibuki Can't Cook, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-21
Updated: 2019-04-21
Packaged: 2020-01-23 12:15:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,001
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18549586
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rangerhitomi/pseuds/rangerhitomi
Summary: "I didn't want to involve you in any of this," Ibuki begins, and pauses. He doesn't know how to express the feelings he's held onto since meeting Mamoru, knowing that, someday, Mamoru's curiosity and protectiveness over his branch and Vanguard would thrust him into this mess headfirst. "It's not because I don't think you're up to the task, but... because I..." He falters. His chest tightens. "I was worried you would get hurt."---Mamoru discovers the truth about the G-Quest, Plan G, and his feelings toward Ibuki.





	essential truths

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place after episode 20 of GIRS Crisis, where Mamoru discovers that the Association had been using him to collect Stride force so Myoujin could summon the Zodiac beasts from Cray.

He'd tried to keep Mamoru out of it, but it's too late now.

Kamui had updated him on his findings at the construction site--a promising lead that had led to yet another dead end in Myoujin Ryuzu's whereabouts--but Ibuki had greater concerns than the destruction of the lab.

_You should check up on Mamoru. I think what we found really hit him hard._

But Mamoru won't reply to texts and won't pick up the phone. Even at his busiest, Mamoru always finds time to talk to Ibuki.

So he knocks on Mamoru's door. After fifteen seconds of silence, he knocks again, more urgently, but even thirty seconds later there is no response.

Maybe he's in the bath, Ibuki rationalizes, or asleep; it's only ten but Mamoru hasn't gotten much sleep lately because of the demands of the G-Quest, so he may have caved and fallen asleep early.

That doesn't matter. They have to talk.

He hears a phone ringing through the front door. It goes unanswered. Undeterred, Ibuki calls him again. And again. Finally, on the fourth call, Mamoru picks up.

"Yes?" His voice is slow and quiet.

"Open the door."

More silence. He thinks for a second that Mamoru has hung up the phone and is prepared to call back a fifth time before he hears a soft, defeated sigh and the squeal of a chair scraping the floor. Ibuki waits.

The door opens. Mamoru wears a too-big t-shirt and sweatpants, a grungy combination of clothes Ibuki has never seen him in before; even at his most exhausted, Mamoru always made it a point to dress well. His eyes are bloodshot and unfocused, staring not at Ibuki but at the door frame. He doesn't speak.

"Are you going to let me in?"

Ibuki barely waits for Mamoru's halfhearted shrug before striding into the apartment and kicking off his shoes. The apartment is clean, with soft lighting and an open kitchen; Ibuki sits on a barstool across from an empty wine glass and a half-empty bottle of wine, and waits.

Mamoru sits and pours himself another glass. Ibuki reaches over and takes it from him, setting it just out of his reach, and Mamoru slumps over, right hand clenching his left shoulder.

"Are you going to tell me what happened to you?"

"I'm sure Kamui already told you about what we found."

"Kamui told me that you had a keycard specifically coded to keep you from being linked to your snooping."

Mamoru's free hand reaches for a glass that wasn't there and closes midair. His empty fist falls to the countertop. "You call it snooping like I shouldn't be involving myself in it."

"You shouldn't," Ibuki says before he can help himself, but he realizes the hypocrisy right away, and so does Mamoru, who scoffs and shakes his head.

"All of you are. You and Kamui and Branch Chief Suzugamori. Countless others. My sister-- my _sister,_ Ibuki!" His voice cracks, and Ibuki would have felt less pain in his chest if Mamoru had stabbed him. "Tokoha and Chrono and Shion are _children_ and you-- you--!"

He folds in on himself, a choked sob forcing its way past his clenched teeth, then another, until Mamoru is face down on the counter with shoulders shaking uncontrollably. Ibuki is helpless to do anything to comfort him; he sits and watches Anjou Mamoru, one of the freest and most optimistic men Ibuki had met in his life, have a complete breakdown in his own kitchen over something Ibuki said, and a hundred more things Ibuki _did_.

There's more to it, Ibuki knows. Mamoru hurts over his exclusion from GIRS Crisis even though he doesn't know much about it. He hurts over Ibuki involving Tokoha in it. But these things aren't the catalyst for Mamoru's current state. There's something else, something that happened at that abandoned construction site that set Mamoru over the edge.

_You should check up on Mamoru. I think what we found really hit him hard._

"I didn't want to involve you in any of this," Ibuki begins, and pauses. He doesn't know how to express the feelings he's held onto since meeting Mamoru, knowing that, someday, Mamoru's curiosity and protectiveness over his branch and Vanguard would thrust him into this mess headfirst. "It's not because I don't think you're up to the task, but... because I..." He falters. His chest tightens. "I was worried you would get hurt."

Mamoru's breathing evens out as he looks up through swollen eyes. Ibuki wants to look away, has never wanted to turn away more, but he forces himself to watch Mamoru straighten up. His hand squeezes the fabric of his too-big t-shirt.

"I had Christopher Lo help me access programs I didn't want to be linked to." Mamoru coughs a few times and rubs the tears from his face. "Things didn't feel right. All the things that happened at United Sanctuary, Kanzaki, the weird updates to the GIRS. Then you said Myoujin Ryuzu had something to do with it. You told me to be careful, because it could cost me more than my job. I think that was your way of telling me not to get involved."

This is true, and Ibuki can't deny it.

"I dug around anyway. You kept trying to dissuade me from intervening further. I kept going. But what I ended up discovering, in the end..." Mamoru shakes his head again and rests a hand on the counter. "Could you ever know what it's like to dedicate your heart and soul to something, only to find out that you were being used the whole time?"

Ibuki has never shared his past with Mamoru. As far as he's concerned, that old Ibuki Kouji, hellbent on destroying Vanguard, is a lost relic of a bygone era, a sin from a former life Ibuki was desperate to sever himself from.

Sometimes, he can still feel them, their seeds planted so deep in his heart that no matter how much he tears at them, one hangs on and sprouts anew during times of doubt and loneliness and pain. He can hear them now, reminding him that hurting Mamoru was the inevitable outcome of his attempts to atone for his past transgressions. _You never should have gotten involved with him in the first place, Kouji,_ they say. _You don't value your own life, but that doesn't mean you should force others to fight your battle._

It's precisely what he had tried to avoid.

They're as different as night and day; Mamoru is kind and gentle, Ibuki is cold and harsh. Mamoru puts others' needs above his own, sacrificing sleep and a social life with a smile on his face if it means more people are able to have fun and strengthen bonds through Vanguard. Ibuki has dragged his only friends into his own attempts at redemption, guilty despite their assurances that they are willing and eager to help. He wants to save Vanguard, but only because he once tried to destroy it; Mamoru has always nurtured it and helped it to grow.

How two fundamentally opposite people could develop a friendship, Ibuki doesn't know. Nor does he understand why he has an instinctive desire to keep Mamoru from getting dragged into it the way he did his few other friends. All he knows is that Mamoru is different, someone to protect.

Had Ibuki known Mamoru back then, Mamoru would have been one of his first targets. Mamoru exemplifies everything Ibuki had once hated about Vanguard: how it's meant to be fun, how one can understand a person's heart through it, how there is no limit to someone's potential if they can only _imagine_ it.

The seeds in his heart laugh as he slides his hand over the counter and places it over Mamoru's.

Mamoru's unfocused eyes move slowly between Ibuki's hand and his face, until he swallows and stares at Ibuki's elbow instead. "I don't know what to do. All the work I've put into developing the G-Quest, the FICAs we distributed, the Stride force, all of it. They used me. The Association used me..."

The dagger in Ibuki's chest twists deeper. He'd known, of course, about the Stride force, had known about Myoujin, had known so much, and yet he let Mamoru flourish in ignorance. But what could he have said? If he'd told Mamoru, and Mamoru had been more deeply involved, the G-Quest would have failed.

_You used him to gather Stride Force, too._

He has to tell him.

"Mamoru." His hand tightens even more. They lock eyes for a second before Mamoru drops his gaze. "The G-Quest had to continue as planned. To stop Myoujin, it had to go on. If there's no Stride force to follow to him, there's no way we could have come this close to finding him."

Mamoru wrenches his hand away. "You too, Ibuki?"

He doesn't have the right to feel guilty, but he does anyway. "I knew you would try to put a stop to it. I knew you had the power to. I couldn't let you."

Another scoff. Mamoru reaches for the wine bottle, still in his reach, and takes a long drink. "I'm tired, Ibuki." He sets the bottle down. Ibuki doesn't move it out of Mamoru's reach this time. "I'm tired of being used. How would you feel? If someone you admired and trusted was using you all along?"

"I do understand," Ibuki whispers. "I was used once, too. Not for my love of Vanguard, but because of my hatred for it."

Mamoru is silent. Ibuki half-expects him to say that he couldn't imagine Ibuki having ever hated Vanguard, but he's grateful for the silence regardless. It's hard enough to bring the Deletors to the forefront of his consciousness without being interrupted trying to drown out the jeering echoing in his head.

"Like you, I had a passion for Vanguard, though in my case it was different. You want everyone to enjoy it; I sought to wipe its existence from the earth. In the end, I failed, but..."

_You may have saved Vanguard for the time, but you already damned yourself, didn't you, Kouji?_

"I can't make up for all I did, but I can try to keep it from happening again."

The silence stretches into minutes, and Mamoru drinks from the bottle again. He must have had a few glasses before Ibuki arrives, because now it's only a quarter of the way full. The glass of wine Ibuki had conficated earlier sits next to his elbow; he picks it up and walks around the counter to the kitchen sink, where he pours it out and rinses it. Mamoru doesn't protest, though his eyes narrow a little, as Ibuki fills it with water, setting it in front of Mamoru while taking the bottle of wine from the counter.

"You should drink that," he says of the water. The remaining wine is corked and put back in the fridge. "You've had a lot of alcohol tonight."

Mamoru drinks the water and staggers to his feet, swaying on the spot. Ibuki catches him by the waist to steady him.

"I can walk just fine."

He can't, and they both know it, but Ibuki settles for moving one hand to the small of his back for support. "Mamoru, I... I'm sorry."

He's not used to apologizing; the words feel foreign on his tongue. Yet, at the same time, they feel _right_ , because he can't bear the thought of Mamoru suffering anymore. He can't bear the thought of Mamoru being anything but happy.

_How would you feel?_

"You said... you asked how I would feel if someone I admired and trusted was using me. Do you... do you trust me, Mamoru?"

 _Do you really admire me?_ is his unspoken question.

"Yes," is Mamoru's simple reply, "and that's why I need you to tell me the truth."

Almost on its own, Ibuki's body draws closer to Mamoru's. "I will. Get some sleep tonight, and I'll tell you everything in the morning."

"Promise?" Mamoru places his hand on Ibuki's shoulder.

"...yes," Ibuki breathes.

His heart stutters.

Their foreheads touch.

"Everything?"

"I swear it."

Mamoru's face is so close Ibuki can taste the plum wine on his breath and see the smudged eyeliner--waterproof, no doubt, if Mamoru's tears didn't wash it away--along the corners of Mamoru's eyes. And it would be so easy, with Mamoru so clearly willing, his eyelashes brushing Ibuki's with every unfocused blink, his mouth open _just so_ , to tilt his jaw forward and--

_He's pretty, isn't he, Kouji? Too pretty and too good for you._

But Mamoru is drunk and exhausted and depressed, and Ibuki can't do that to him, too.

"Let's get you to bed," he whispers instead, and Mamoru's mouth closes.

Mamoru brushes his teeth and uses the toilet. Ibuki waits outside the bathroom for him, leading Mamoru to his bed by the hand. It's the most he can let himself do, he thinks, tucking Mamoru in, but Mamoru reaches out for him again as he turns to leave.

"Aren't you staying?"

There's a panic in Mamoru's voice that stabs at Ibuki's heart.

"Of course. I'll sleep on the sofa."

"But..."

"I'll still be here when you wake up, Mamoru."

Mamoru's head falls back onto his pillow. "If you need some clothes to sleep in, shirts are in the top drawer. There are extra blankets in the linen closet in the kitchen."

Ibuki resists the urge to brush back the hair falling into Mamoru's face. "Thank you. I'll see you in the morning."

* * *

 

Mamoru wakes at three in the morning with a pounding migraine. He rolls over, groaning, and sees a glass of water and two painkillers sitting on his nightstand.

 _Thought you might need these,_ he can practically hear Ibuki saying, and he smiles a little even as he groans with the effort of sitting up enough to drink the water before slumping back and letting sleep claim him.

* * *

 

He wakes again a couple of hours later to pee. The headache has been reduced to a dull throb, manageable, but he's still dizzy as he stumbles his way in the dark toward the toilet.

Ibuki sleeps on the sofa in the living room, lying on his back in some of Mamoru's clothes with his arms crossed over his chest like some kind of vampire, and Mamoru can't help but laugh to himself.

* * *

 

When he wakes a third time, the sun is shining through his window and Ibuki sits fully dressed on the side of his bed with his hair pulled back in a high ponytail. His headache is still there, somewhere behind his eyes, the inevitable hangover from a night of wine and crying.

He's suddenly embarrassed as Ibuki wordlessly hands over two more painkillers and another glass of water; he's made a spectacle of himself, drunk and crying in his kitchen, and his face heats up at another memory, one where he was close enough to Ibuki to see the faint freckles on his nose that he had never noticed before, and the tiny clumps of mascara on Ibuki's lower lashes.

The glass makes a small clinking sound against the nightstand.

"Take a shower." It's not much of a suggestion. "I'll get breakfast ready."

Mamoru simply nods; Ibuki leaves without looking back.

* * *

 

The scalding shower water cascades down Mamoru's back, turning his skin red; a shallow cut on his left shoulder, somehow the only injury he'd received from the robots in the abandoned construction site, stings at the sensation. He pays it little mind; with a clearing, mostly-sober mind, he replays the discoveries of the day before over and over, a cassette he can't stop rewinding.

_A Stride force conveyance device... a new GIRS upgrade... the new, Association-issued FICA..._

The connections are obvious.

_The FICA to collect energy from fighters no matter where they are... the GIRS upgrade to draw massive amounts of Stride force from the strongest fighters... the Stride force conveyance device transmits the energy to Myoujin..._

He can see his role in all of it.

_Myoujin directed the Association... we distributed dozens of FICAs at Dragon Empire events... Dragon Empire sponsored the G-Quest... the Stride force the GIRS and the FICAs collected during the tournaments and events is what Myoujin needs to complete his plans..._

He, Kagero Clan Leader Anjou Mamoru, was integral to the whole plan, and he didn't even realize it.

"Mamoru?" It's Ibuki. "You're turning the whole apartment into a sauna. You should turn the heat down before you burn yourself or dehydrate. You need to keep water in your body to flush out the alcohol."

"Yeah."

When he gets out of the shower, Ibuki has left the door open. Mamoru is dizzy again.

* * *

 

Something's burning.

Not in the way of _it's on fire_ or _the sprinkler system has activated,_ but that something that is cooking has achieved a state of chemical composition that it hadn't been when it was put in the pan and was now filling the apartment with an unpleasant smell.

The source is Ibuki, who is cursing under his breath at a pan as he scrapes unidentifiable lumps of _something_ off the bottom with a rubber spatula. Mamoru grimaces.

"Erm, Ibuki... what are you cooking?"

Ibuki looks up long enough to acknowledge that Mamoru had arrived in the kitchen. "Eggs."

"I... see..."

As he watches Ibuki hunch over the sink as he scrubs out the pan, each stroke more futile than the last, Mamoru comes to a bewildering realization: _Ibuki has never cooked eggs before._

"Ibuki," Mamoru tries again, "did you, you know, add oil or cooking spray to the pan before putting the eggs in?"

Ibuki pauses mid-scrub. "Oil?"

It takes another twenty minutes to salvage some of the eggs and clean the pan; Ibuki is reluctant to use the toaster oven, so Mamoru lightly toasts some bread for the both of them while Ibuki brews some coffee (this task, at least, Ibuki seems well-equipped for).

Runny yolks with fried whites was how Mamoru tended to eat his eggs, but he eats the overcooked scrambled eggs without complaint. "Thank you, Ibuki. I appreciate it."

"Don't mention it."

"Sometimes I don't know whether to tell you to be more humble or less."

Ibuki makes a noise halfway between a chuckle and dismissiveness before setting his empty coffee cup on the counter. "By the way, Ryuutaro isn't expecting you in today."

Work. That's right; he'd been so preoccupied with thoughts of the Association that he'd nearly forgotten he still had to show up and do his job without letting on that he knew something was wrong. And how unfair it all is, that his own livelihood and passion has been stripped of its meaning to him.

"Did you call off for me?" He should be upset, but he still has a headache and he's exhausted. There's only so much work he could do well feeling like this.

"I told Ryuutaro that you're working with me today." Ibuki stands, placing his hands on his hips as he stretches. "You need the rest, and... I promised."

_Get some rest, and I'll tell you everything in the morning._

Mamoru nods. "I'll clean up breakfast. If you need a toothbrush, I have a few spares in the medicine cabinet."

* * *

 

As it turns out, the Association somehow converting fighters' imaginative energy into a power source is the least impossible part of the whole thing.

In the span of one day, Mamoru's entire world has cascaded around him; the organization he had dedicated his life to had been _using_ the efforts he has made to spread a love for Vanguard across Tokyo, his _own_ love for Vanguard, to further Myoujin Ryuzu's goals to forcibly draw units from planet Cray to Earth. Cray, _by the way,_ is a real place, its destiny connected to Earth's...

He's silent as Ibuki talks, taking in every word despite the outlandishness of it all. Coming from anyone else, Mamoru may not have believed some of it. But Ibuki is different. Dismissing Ibuki's openness about this entire situation was outside of Mamoru's realm of possibility.

"The last stage of the plan is for Try 3 and Q4 to fight. Myoujin will acquire the necessary Stride force to call the last unit from Cray. When he does, we'll crash the entire GIRS and pinpoint exactly where he is. That's when we'll stop him."

Mamoru leans forward with his elbows on his knees, staring at the floor.

"That's everything," Ibuki adds, somewhat awkwardly. When Mamoru still doesn't look up, or move, Ibuki leans close, dipping his head low so he can see Mamoru's face. "Are you okay?"

A wordless nod. Mamoru isn't sure what to say, or where to start.

"I... I'm sorry for not telling you sooner, it's just..."

"You didn't want to drag me into it," Mamoru whispers, finally breaking his silence.

"You love your job. You love Vanguard. I didn't want to tarnish either of those things for you, and--"

"I know."

He understands Ibuki's concern now. It's so much to take in all at once, Vanguard being used for something so _horrible_ _;_ Mamoru wishes with all his heart that there was a way for him to forget it all...

...but then, that would be willing complicity.

"I can't turn my back on this now."

Ibuki touches his shoulder. Mamoru reflexively jolts upright and Ibuki removes it just as quickly.

"I'm going to fight."

A hint of a smile forms on Ibuki's face. "If it costs you your job? Or your life?"

Mamoru shakes his head. "Vanguard is my job. Vanguard is my life." He laughs, but without much humor. "Maybe that's a little sad. But if doing the right thing costs me everything... I can be at peace with that."

"I see." Ibuki sighs and looks down, the smile becoming more prominent. "I've always admired that about you. You're the only one I've ever known who has never used Vanguard selfishly."

How incredible, that Ibuki can open himself up to Mamoru like this, that he trusts Mamoru enough to be so open, to worry about him like this.

He moves closer, until their thighs touch, and he wills himself to take Ibuki by the hand. The scene from the night before plays out in his head for the third time that morning, how close they had come but how far away they still were.

Ibuki's hand is cold.

"Ibuki Kouji."

"Anjou Mamoru."

The mascara is gone from Ibuki's eyelashes, but his strikingly red eyes are still beautiful. Without the thick hair framing his face, he looks thinner, and Mamoru can see clearly his high cheekbones from up close. He drinks it in, this most vulnerable side of Ibuki, the gentleness he is certain no one has ever seen before.

But the closer they draw together, the more Mamoru can see the conflict in Ibuki's eyes, and he stops just short of Ibuki's lips.

It's not the right time.

He pulls away.

Ibuki lets out a breath he'd been holding, untangling his fingers from Mamoru's. "I'm sorry."

"No need to be."

"It's just that--" Ibuki leans back onto the sofa with a heavy sigh. "It makes this harder."

Mamoru understands.

"Myoujin isn't above getting rid of people who cross him, remember when I told you about Sh--"

"Ibuki, I understand. I promise, I understand." He understands, but it's too late to take it all back now. Those feelings will remain at the surface of Mamoru's thoughts throughout everything that is to come, as he knows they must eat at Ibuki. Why else would he be so eager to explain himself away like this? The desperation to keep Mamoru safe might hinder his actions. But Mamoru won't let anything happen to cause Ibuki conflict. He's strong enough for that. "It's almost over." With Ibuki leading the way, Mamoru has no doubts of this. "And when it's over, and things go back to normal..."

The unspoken promise hangs in the air between them.


End file.
